Re: FreeBSD Security Advisory FreeBSD-SA-20:33.openssl

Hi John-Mark,

On Thu, Dec 10, 2020 at 10:46:28PM -0800, John-Mark Gurney wrote:
> FreeBSD Security Advisories wrote this message on Wed, Dec 09, 2020 at 23:03 +0000:
> > versions included in FreeBSD 12.x.  This vulnerability is also known to
> > affect OpenSSL versions included in FreeBSD 11.4.  However, the OpenSSL
> > project is only giving patches for that version to premium support contract
> > holders.  The FreeBSD project does not have access to these patches and
> > recommends FreeBSD 11.4 users to either upgrade to FreeBSD 12.x or leverage
> > up to date versions of OpenSSL in the ports/pkg system. The FreeBSD Project
> > may update this advisory to include FreeBSD 11.4 should patches become
> > publicly available.
> 
> FreeBSD needs to reevaluate the continued reliance on OpenSSL for our
> crypto/TLS library.  1.0.2 which is in 11-stable has not had support
> for almost a year, and 11 is going to have almost another year of
> support during which time if there's another vuln, we'll again be
> leaving the users in a bad place.

To be blunt: didn't we try reevaluating already, and come up empty?

OpenSSL's 5-year support lifetime is quite generous, in my experience, and
we are suffering more of a clash of release dates than a fundamental
support-lifetime mismatch.

> I have not heard if OpenSSL has bother to address the breakage of
> /dev/crypto that also recently came up, but it does appear that they
> are no longer a good fit for FreeBSD.

I'm not sure why you leap from issues with the devcrypto engine to a
broader "no longer a good fit" conclusion.  The devcrypto engine is hardly
a core piece of functionality, and jhb has
https://github.com/openssl/openssl/pull/13468 up waiting for review.

I regularly commit to openssl from my FreeBSD system, including the
build+test cycle; the core functionality remains well-supported.  To be
honest, I didn't bother caring about devcrypto because I didn't expect it
to be widely used, given that you have to have special hardware to overcome
the hit of syscall context switching.

> Even as it stands, FreeBSD has committed to supporting 12 for close
> to a year longer than OpenSSL has for 1.1.1 meaning we will be in the
> same situation we are w/ 11 in a few years.
> 
> Assuming 13 releases w/ OpenSSL, we'll be even in a worse situation
> than we are now.  OpenSSL 3.0.0 has no support commitment announced
> yet, and sticking with 1.1.1 for 13 will put us even in a worse
> situation than we are today.

OpenSSL 3.0.0 is not going to be LTS; I expect it to go EoL before 1.1.1
does.  (And I expect 1.1.1 to be supported past 2023-09-11, though of
course I do not speak for the project.)  I also think that 3.0.0 is not the
recommended relase for anyone who doesn't need the FIPS compatibility;
there's been a substantial rearchitecture and will likely be growing pains
as tend to accompany dot-zero releases.

> What are peoples thoughts on how to address the support mismatch between
> FreeBSD and OpenSSL?  And how to address it?
> 
> IMO, FreeBSD does need to do something, and staying w/ OpenSSL does
> not look like a viable option.

IMO OpenSSL 1.1.1 is generally in pretty good shape and much easier to
maintain than 1.0.2 was.  I have yet to see an alternative suitable for
inclusion in the base system that would be more viable.

-Ben
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